


Toast to the ones that we lost on the way; 'Cause the drinks bring back all the memories

by Splat_Dragon



Category: Red Dead Redemption (Video Games)
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Cross-Posted on Tumblr, Epilogue, Graphic Description of Corpses, Grief, Hurt No Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Major Spoilers, Spoilers, Tumblr Prompt, quotes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-02
Updated: 2020-04-02
Packaged: 2021-02-28 18:13:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23451502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Splat_Dragon/pseuds/Splat_Dragon
Summary: Prompt: John's still sorting out his complicated feeling about Dutch after Micah's death when he drunkenly asks Charles how he thinks Arthur died (Charles having been the one who buried him, of course).Fueled either by liquid courage or just no longer able to contain himself, he blurted out “How do you think Arthur died?”John hadn’t stopped staring at him, and he knew there was no way he’d be walking away without giving an answer. The thing was, though, he didn’t know. It had taken him a day to get to Beaver Hollow, and Arthur had been long dead by then. He hadn’t been there to see him bleed, or collapse, or breathe his last, only to collect his body with Miss Grimshaw’s and bury it.
Comments: 5
Kudos: 39





	Toast to the ones that we lost on the way; 'Cause the drinks bring back all the memories

Something was eating at John, anyone could see it.

Even Charles, light-headed with the pain medicine Abigail had forced down his throat, could tell. He wasn’t one to pry, though, so he sat at the campfire with the man, staring into the flames and waiting for him to speak.

That was the thing about him. People seemed to feel as though they could bare their souls to him; perhaps it was because he didn’t talk much. Or that he just listened, let them talk without feeling the need to give advice in turn unless they asked for it. He’d dare say that half the people in the gang had used him as a sounding board at least once, and even more than that had told the air their problems without realizing that he was there.

Sadie, Tilly, Mary-Beth, even Arthur, all of them had talked to him, sitting by the fire or leaning against a tree or rock, sprawling by the lake in Clemens Point or, when it came to Arthur, riding with him as they went to help Eagle Flies.

And Arthur had _hurt_. He had known that he was sick, how the others had missed it he would never know. His gaunt face, the way his clothes hung off him where once they clung to him as though a second skin, the rattling coughs that sometimes kept him up at night. But having it confirmed ( _“I didn’t tell you before but, I saw a doctor. It’s pretty bad, and it’s gonna get worse.”_ ) had _burned_ , knowing that there was nothing he could do, that even if he had been able to get Arthur out, he would have been made to watch him waste away. He had known he was sick, but to know he was dying in front of him had hit him harder than he’d expected.

John never had, though, so he supposed it was his turn.

  
  


Of all the members of the gang, he’d never been able to figure John out.

Not for lack of trying, though. It was no secret that he and Arthur had butted heads more often than not, but he’d been able to tell they’d grown closer towards the end. He could see John splitting away, and had expected him to be one of the ones who would cut and run when they’d started to, join Trelawney and Uncle and the women when they up and left, but he hadn’t. He’d left with the Wapiti before things had truly gone wrong, before Dutch had left him to die, but John had caught him up on the happenings while they worked on the Hope.

He still didn’t understand John, not completely, but they’d become, he’d dare to say, friends over the last few months, so he sat, and passed a bottle of rum between himself and John, sipping at it where John gulped it down. His head already felt stuffed with cotton from whatever Abigail had given him, and with Sadie down recuperating, and John already well on his way to drunk, they needed someone sober enough to fire a gun with some sort of accuracy.

  
  


If he was to guess, though, he’d say it had to do with Dutch.

Sadie had told him, before Abigail had shoved the needle in her arm (and Sadie had fought like a cornered wolf, she had not wanted anything to do with a painkiller or sedative but as bullheaded as Sadie was Abigail was even more so), that they’d met Dutch up there on the mountain, walking out of Micah’s cabin. He’d said that he’d been there to kill Micah, too ( _“Same as you, I suppose,”_ he’d said according to her, though why he’d been in Micah’s cabin if that was why Charles couldn’t say, and Sadie had also said that Micah’d said that Dutch and he were _“teaming up once more,”_ which made a hell of a lot more sense to him), and though he didn’t know everything he knew that Dutch used to mean a lot to John. That before he’d joined the gang, a long, long time ago, Dutch had been like John’s father, that he’d raised him, had raised Arthur, too, and though in the end Dutch had betrayed him, betrayed all of them, left John to die, gotten Hosea (who’d also raised them, he’d been told, and he could see it a lot easier than he could see Dutch playing father) and Sean and Kieran and Arthur and all the others killed. His mother had been taken when he was young, and his father had fallen to the drink, but he couldn’t imagine how John felt, having your father fall so far and then running into him again years later.

  
  


He took another swig of the bottle, some Guarma Rum that John had found in Uncle’s stash and brought out to the campfire, before passing it over to John. The man tilted his head back, gulping down what remained, more of it pouring out the corners of his mouth to soak his shirt than going down his throat.

And then, fueled either by liquid courage or just no longer able to contain himself, he blurted out “How do you think Arthur died?”

Charles would have to admit it took him somewhat by surprise, and he turned to look at John, taking a moment to compose himself. Even now, years later, though the pain had dulled, Arthur’s loss was still a wound in his chest—he’d never been one to get close to others, but Arthur was one of the few good men he had known, although he’d have denied it to his dying day, and having his death brought up so abruptly tugged painfully at that wound, made scar-tissue that he’d thought long-healed throb and remind him of its existence.

“You, you buried him.” John slurred, eyes somehow focused yet glassy all the same, and Charles felt like he was being stared _through_ , as though John was staring at him so fierce he’d be able to see Arthur’s death through him. “You told me so. So… you saw him, after he, after he passed.” and he had, of course he had. A day or so later, when he’d seen the news of ‘the end of the Van Der Linde gang’ in the newspaper, all the way up in South Dakota, not yet having reached Canada, and he was glad for it as he’d never have known if they had. He’d ridden Taima hard to come back, he’d had to see with his own eyes if it were true—some part of him knew that it was, the photo in the article was of Arthur’s wagon burning, but he’d needed to see it with his own two eyes, know who was dead and who had survived.

He hadn’t been surprised, per say, to see the news. Even Arthur, staunch supporter of Dutch he had been, had admitted that the Gang was just about done. Had even tried to come with him, to leave everything behind to help escort the Wapiti to safety. But he hadn’t expected that it would be the Pinkertons that would end them. He had been certain that it would be Dutch himself, in his ego-driven insanity, that would destroy them. Would put a bullet between their eyes, or get them caught and be the cause of the nooses that snapped taut around their necks.

  
  


John hadn’t stopped staring at him, and he knew there was no way he’d be walking away without giving an answer. The thing was, though, he _didn’t_ know. It had taken him a day to get to Beaver Hollow, and Arthur had been long dead by then. He hadn’t been there to see him bleed, or collapse, or breathe his last, only to collect his body with Miss Grimshaw’s and bury it.

“I’m not sure,” he finally settled on, and he could see John puff up like an angry kitten, in a way that might have been scary if he wasn’t two sheets to the wind.

“How do you think, then? I… I need to…” his voice faltered, and he shook his head, looking very confused when he tried to sup from the rum only to find it empty, “I just… want to know.”

John had told him, once, and only once, looking sad and pitiful and half drunk then, too, about the last time he’d seen Arthur. His brother, gaunt and dying, face void of any color, eyes bloodshot and looking so, so tired. He’d told him to run, that he’d _“hold them off”_ and to _“get the hell out of here and be a goddamn man”_ and then, Charles had known, then, that he was only talking because he was drunk, and John wouldn’t look him in the eye for a week after, John had admitted that he’d told him _“You’re my brother,”_ and Arthur had said _“I know.”_

And looking at John, now, it didn’t escape him that John looked horribly guilty. Arthur had gone up on that mountain to draw Pinkerton's attention away from him, and never came back down. It wasn't John’s fault, and Arthur had insisted on it, would never have gotten off that mountain either way from the sound of it, (John had told him that Arthur had said so, that he’d apparently thought that _“We ain’t both gonna make it,”_ )

  
  


He remembered riding into Beaver Hollow, the smell of smoke still cloying in the air. The corpses of the Pinkertons had been gathered, though he could see where they had lain, the dirt disturbed and dark with their blood, and their blood stained his footprints as he dismounted and walked into the center of the clearing, hand on the grip of his gun just in case.

It was hard to reconcile _this_ with his camp. The one where he’d sat to the side, relaxing as the others sang along to whatever Javier was playing on the guitar. Keeping an eye on Jack as he ran around, chasing Cain or trying to catch some bug or the other, watching them dance around, tripping over their feet as Dutch hurried to grab Molly after putting on that ridiculous gramophone of his.

The one where they’d slowly separated, Micah’s group staying off to their side, while ‘Arthur’s’ (though at the time they hadn’t thought of themselves as that) kept to themselves. Sitting awkwardly together when Dutch explained his ‘plan’, Micah standing behind him and grinning. The camp where he’d watched Arthur wither away, where he’d watched them mourn, had mourned in turn, where he’d tried to keep them together before giving up, keeping them fed and little else as he turned his attentions elsewhere.

The wagons and tents had been left to burn and fall apart, crumpling in on themselves. Tarps, little more than shreds of leather, clung desperately to their frames, shattered, burnt wood standing tall like so many ghastly grave-markers. Glass had crunched beneath his boots as he walked, and he’d looked to see a photograph beneath his boot, picking it up carefully. The glass was coated so thickly with dirt and ash and he hadn’t known what else, and he’d been grateful for his gloves as he wiped it clean, staring at the photograph.

It was one of Dutch, Hosea and Arthur, when they were all young. Before everything went wrong, when it was just the three of them, before John, before Susan even, and it was strange to look back into their past when he was walking into the corpse of their fall.

He’d broken the glass, the imprint of his boot clear in the shattering of it. They’d been sat Hosea, Dutch, then Arthur, with Dutch standing between them, and his boot had landed just so, the glass splitting to put a vaguely V-shaped crack that ran between Dutch and the other two, separating Dutch from them. Ice had settled low in his stomach, at the sight, and he’d shoved the picture into his satchel, not sure what he’d do with it later, but not wanting to leave it behind.

(He’d lost it, some street rat stealing that satchel while he was brawling as the White Wolf in Saint Denis, and had never forgiven himself for it)

Charles’ eyes had been drawn, somehow, to a particular tent, collapsed in an odd way, he thought it was Pearsons’ but the camp had been scattered, thrown about and it was hard to tell whose from whose, but it was about in the spot where the mess wagon had been. The tarp had been bulging up in an odd way, too long and unnatural to be just an odd way of settling, and for a moment he had ~~hoped~~ thought that, maybe, it had been a horse. One of the smaller ones, the spares kept around camp in case they had to hurry, or bring one of the girls along or one of the horses needed to rest. But the shape wasn’t right, and it was too small for even the smallest of their horses, for even the Count, and so he had ~~hoped~~ thought that, maybe, it had been a fallen Pinkerton, one that had been missed in the mess.

  
  


But some part of him had known, even as he approached, reaching out with his gun to carefully move the tarp aside. The body had begun to rot, smelled of it, but was still whole, hadn’t turned colors or fallen apart, yet. He’d known from the moment he’d seen the dress, too elegant for a gang such as theirs, black turned brown with long dried blood, a tired face relaxed in death, graying hair loosed from its pompadour, shotgun not far from her hands.

He hadn’t expected the grief that had struck him as he’d looked upon the body of Susan Grimshaw; they’d never been close, but he’d never been particularly close with any of the Van der Linde gang, bar a few. But she’d been one of the good ones, as good as any of them had been, cared deeply about all of the gang members even if she’d been harsh in her way of showing it, and he was sorry for her death.

So when he picked her up, he was careful, as gentle as he could be, cradling her as he carried her over to Taima, settling her gently on her rump. She deserved better than to be slung over his horse like some bounty, but he hadn’t brought a wagon or any other way to carry a corpse, so all he could do was tie her down and hope he’d find somewhere close by to bury her.

And then, as a passing thought, he’d grabbed her shotgun and tied it to Taima’s saddle as well to bury her with.

  
  


Why he’d kept looking, he couldn’t say. Maybe it was because he could see that there had been _so many_ Pinkertons, there was no way that, with how few the gang had been reduced to, they’d only lose one. And the tracks were obvious, leading deeper and deeper into the cave, splattered here in there with familiar amounts of blood that had set dread deep into his stomach, and he’d known where that ladder let out, grabbed Taima and ridden her up to it, found the tracks easily as they switched from boot- to hoof-prints, walking Taima slowly as he followed them.

It hadn’t taken him to find Arthur’s horse and Old Boy.

Arthur had _loved_ that horse, and there it had been, splayed out on the grass, half eaten away by scavengers. If it weren’t for that saddle, he might not have recognized it, its fur dulled in death, white bones gleaming where skin and hide had been eaten away. Old Boy had been more recognizable, his brown hide only barely darker, lighter mane splayed out on the grass, side torn into, and he’d wanted to bury them but they were both larger and heavier than Taima, and the ground around there was barely suitable for burying a human, was far too rocky to build a grave for a horse, so he’d been made to leave them behind to be picked clean by scavengers, and he’d thought that, maybe, he could return some day and retrieve their skulls.

He never had.

  
  


The ground had gotten rockier and rockier not long after, an incline that Taima, sure-footed as she was, had begun to struggle with, skidding and stumbling. So he’d left her behind, wrapped her reins around her saddle-horn, trusting her to come when he called, not wanting to tie her down—they were in cougar country, and with a corpse on her back she’d be nothing more than a delicious meal if he did.

The tracks had been harder to follow as the ground grew rockier and rockier, but he’d been able to follow them in the dust, disturbed as it was by their boots, darkened with small sprays of blood. There came a point where it had split, and it had taken him a time to follow it—he wouldn’t have known if the tracks that kept going hadn’t clearly belonged to one man, and there was no sign of the other falling. Finally, though, he had been able to find the tracks of the other, climbing up a sharp incline, and had followed that—the other’s tracks would be easier to pick up, and the one climbing up was splattered with blood, and something had bid him to follow.

  
  


He’d lost the tracks at the edge of a cliff or, at least, what he’d thought was a cliff. It had ended abruptly, where it had looked like the man had knelt for a moment, before up and vanishing. Charles had walked around, quickly finding another pair of tracks, these ones running, and from the looks of it they should have intersected with the others’. And then he’d looked over the cliff, and realized it was more ledge then cliff, and that there was another beneath it.

So, as carefully as he could, he’d dropped down onto the lower ledge, looking around. The ground had been a mess, dust and dirt thrown up in a clear struggle, covered in splatters of blood—bigger than the ones he’d seen before and, looking up, there was disturbed dirt on the underside of the ledge, too, and blood as well. Something had dragged on the ground, he realized, stepping back and looking down beneath his feet, the ground streaked through, and he followed the path with his eyes, an odd sort of trepidation settling deep in his chest.

  
  


He’d missed the body, at first.

It had been growing late, growing dark, and the body was out on the very ledge of a precipice, so he hadn’t immediately noticed it. But the drag marks led right to it, and then he wondered how he’d missed it. His heart had been in his throat as he approached it, the body little more than a indecipherable blob at first, but as he grew near his heart had stuttered, then dropped into his stomach as he began to see it more in detail—

that tan jacket, the blue shirt becoming more clear as he grew nearer. that strange blond-brown hair that changed colors with the sun and then, when he was standing beside him

green-blue eyes, glazed and stony as a river-rock in death, but undeniable.

“Oh, _Arthur_ ,” 

  
  


John was still staring at him, and though he had never been one for fidgeting, beneath John’s fierce stare, (drunk as he was, John’s gaze was stabbing through him harsher than any blade), he wished he had something in his hands to occupy them; his harmonica, lost years ago, to polish, or his gun to do the same, the rum bottle to roll between them or something to whittle.

  
  


He thought back, to turning Arthur over. He thought that, maybe, Arthur had been leaning over, looking at the rising sun (perhaps it was a romanticized notion, but from the way he’d been positioned it was what came to mind), but in the days that had passed he’d slumped, stiffening with rigor mortis before going limp again, hunched over in a way that could only ever be accidental, in a way that made his own neck and back ache in sympathy; when he’d turned him over, everything in his head had screamed _wrongwrongwrong_ , in that way anyone’s did when dealing with a corpse. A human is wired to want to stay far away, for fear that whatever killed that person is still nearby, that it might kill _them_ , too, whether it be sickness or predator, or merely infection from touching a corpse.

But this was his friend, and so despite the skin that slipped beneath his fingers, shifting unnaturally, he’d knelt beside him, a deep frown twisting his face. His face had blanched, blood settling at the bottom of his legs, in his rear, from how he’d been sitting, but still his face was grayed, marbled in death, and horribly bruised, both his eyes blackened, lips split and cheekbones visibly broken, caved in, shattered bones protruding, pressing against translucent skin. Brown, dried blood surrounded his mouth, his chin, darkened the collar of his beloved shirt.

  
  


Looking at John, the man’s eyes pleading despite his fierce gaze, he hesitated. He _didn’t_ know what had killed Arthur. The man didn’t look like he’d been in pain when he’d died—his face had been smooth, devoid of those lines of stress that had been etched so deep, but that could be contributed to the slippage, too. His face had been… well, it had been destroyed. It had looked like he’d been beaten, pinned down and had his face smashed in, and from the state of the place where he’d found him it wouldn’t surprise him (although it had looked like Arthur had put up a hell of a fight, too) if he had, but the way he’d been slumped against the rock… well, that didn’t make sense either. It hadn’t looked like he’d been thrown down, left to rot, but as though he’d dragged himself there.

“I’m not sure,” he finally admitted, and though John didn’t move, didn’t say a word, in his eyes he looked as though he’d been struck, the distress there obvious. “He… he was in pretty bad shape. Looked like he’d been in a hell of a fight but,” he searched for his words, “he didn’t look like he was suffering at the end. I think…” and he did, nodding as he turned from John’s gaze to look into the flames, “I think it was the tuberculosis that took him, in the end.”

  
  


There was silence, for a long moment, tension that throbbed in the air like a thing alive. Finally, John gave a sigh that said more than a thousand words could, and stood, stumbling away towards the house, bottle of rum still clutched in his hand.

He’d asked Charles in hopes of settling his mind, of easing something that ate at him every day, that kept him up at night, and found himself with more questions than before.


End file.
